FRAMINGHAM – If Joann Morrison had not gone to Joseph P. Keefe Technical School, she may not have discovered her love for helping others through nursing.

"Our education at Keefe Tech is unique because it has provided us with a clear and promising pathway to our future," Morrison, the valedictorian of the Class of 2014, told her 144 fellow graduates at Saturday’s commencement ceremony.

Morrison and other speakers, addressing graduates in the school’s gymnasium, said four years at Keefe Tech has prepared the class for the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead. She encouraged graduates to look at challenges to come as opportunities to better themselves.

Speakers recounted memories of becoming adept at a career, mentoring younger students, serving MetroWest communities and excelling in an array of competitions.

More than half of the graduates will go on to college while many others will enter the workforce, and eight students plan to enter the military, according to Superintendent-Director Jonathan Evans.

Evans said graduates chose to come to Keefe Tech, which serves students from Ashland, Framingham, Holliston, Hopkinton and Natick, to do something different than many of their middle school classmates.

Evans encouraged graduates to be lifelong learners, since the jobs 20 years from now will require different skills than the ones of today.

"While you have reached a successful end to your high school careers, your learning continues and will continue throughout your lives," Evans said.

Salutatorian Siobhon Cox said a failed test score is only a number, and is not indicative of one’s success.

"We all experience failure at at least one point in our lives," Cox said. "But we have the ability to carry on and learn from our mistakes."

Graduates, she said, will be defined by how hard they work for the future and how they set and meet goals.

After the ceremony, Austin Dean and Aaron Webster said they will miss shop classes, field trips and adventures from four years at Keefe Tech.

"It seems like the time flew by," Webster said. "I’m in disbelief," Dean said of graduating.

Both students said Keefe Tech prepared them well to become full-time plumbers.

National Honor Society President Beatriz Alves referenced a quote from President Barack Obama in her speech, in which Obama once said, "Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time … We are the change that we seek."

Alves told fellow graduates that up until now they have been learning and listening.

"This will be the moment where we follow our dreams, where we discover our true selves … It is time to make a change that we have been waiting for," Alves said.

Brian Benson can be reached at 508-626-3964 or bbenson@wickedlocal.com. Follow him on Twitter @bbensonmwdn.